乌焉成马 / 烏焉成馬

wū​yān​chéng​mǎ

copying begets mistakes

Characterizes the way words become corrupted through repeated copying; refers to how the characters [[乌|烏|wu1]], [[焉|焉|yan1]], and [[马|馬|ma3]] look similar and are easily confused.

乌 (literal) → 乌/烏 · wū · crow 焉 (literal) → 焉 · yān · [sentence-final] 成 (literal) → 成 · chéng · to become 马 (literal) → 马/馬 · mǎ · horse

Changed: simplified, traditional, gloss, definition, pinyin, variant pinyin, variants, separable parts, decomposition

created sense May 20, 2026, 07:57 PM